From: les@jmdl.com (JMDL Digest) To: joni-digest@smoe.org Subject: JMDL Digest V2000 #462 Reply-To: joni@smoe.org Sender: les@jmdl.com Errors-To: les@jmdl.com Precedence: bulk Archives: http://www.smoe.org/lists/joni Websites: http://www.jmdl.com http://www.jonimitchell.com Unsubscribe: mailto:joni-digest-request@smoe.org?body=unsubscribe JMDL Digest Tuesday, August 22 2000 Volume 2000 : Number 462 The 'Official' Joni Mitchell Homepage, created by Wally Breese, can be found at http://www.jonimitchell.com. It contains the latest news, a detailed bio, Original Interviews, essays, lyrics and much much more. --- The JMDL website can be found at http://www.jmdl.com and contains interviews, articles, the member gallery, archives, and much more. --- Ashara has set up a "Wally Breese Memorial Fund" with all donations going directly towards the upkeep of the website. Wally kept the website going with his own funds. it is now up to US to help Jim continue. If you would like to donate to this fund, please make all checks payable to: Jim Johanson and send them to: Ashara Stansfield P.O. Box 215 Topsfield, MA. 01983 USA ========== TOPICS and authors in this Digest: -------- NYTimes.com Article: For Joni Mitchell, Artist, Singing Was Not Enough [] Re: Lyrics [Christopher Otterbeck ] Re:New York Times covers Mendel [Bern44105@aol.com] new york times article... [CJphoto@aol.com] Re: Lyrics ["M & C Urbanski" ] quote of the day [Susan McNamara ] Re: One year ago today in JMDL history (NJC) [Siresorrow@aol.com] new york times article on joni [Michael Bird ] BSN-music questions [m.harmssen@t-online.de (m.harmssen)] Re: BSN-music questions [SCJoniGuy@aol.com] Re: BSN-music questions ["Christopher J. Treacy" ] BSN inquiries ["Christopher J. Treacy" ] Ray Davies featured in Salon.com's Brilliant Careers (NJC) [Murphycopy@ao] Re: NYTimes.com Article: For Joni Mitchell, Artist, Singing Was Not Enough [RandyRemote ] Re: BSN-music questions [RandyRemote ] Wayne Shorter [Steve Dulson ] Fwd: Re: NYTimes.com Article: For Joni Mitchell, Artist, Singing Was Not Enough [Susan McNamara ] Re: BSN-music questions [IVPAUL42@aol.com] Re: Re: NYTimes.com Article: For Joni Mitchell, Artist, SingingWas Not Enough ["Kakki" ] Re: BSN-music questions [m.harmssen@t-online.de (m.harmssen)] Re: Wayne Shorter [m.harmssen@t-online.de (m.harmssen)] BSN [m.harmssen@t-online.de (m.harmssen)] Amelia & More ["Susan" ] Re: BSN-music questions [catman ] Re: NJC not just any.... [FMYFL@aol.com] RE: BSN-music questions ["Wally Kairuz" ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 08:46:36 -0400 (EDT) From: sem8@cornell.edu Subject: NYTimes.com Article: For Joni Mitchell, Artist, Singing Was Not Enough This article from NYTimes.com has been sent to you by sue sem8@cornell.edu. JMDL enjoy group!! sue sem8@cornell.edu /-------------------- advertisement -----------------------\ Celebrate Summer with a NYTimes.com Photo Screensaver NYTimes.com's latest screensaver captures the unforgettable moments from Coney Island amusement park. Enjoy these images every day on your computer, absolutely free. http://www.nytimes.com/partners/screensaver/index.html?eta2 \----------------------------------------------------------/ For Joni Mitchell, Artist, Singing Was Not Enough August 22, 2000 ARTS ABROAD By JAMES BROOKE SASKATOON, Saskatchewan -- In a report card note to the parents of Roberta Joan Anderson a few decades back, the sixth grade teacher at Queen Elizabeth School here offered this starchy recommendation: "Joan should pay attention to other subjects than art." Almost half a century later, Joni Mitchell has come home to this city in the Canadian prairies where she grew up and where her parents still live. And she has brought her art with her. From 500 paintings, drawings and photographs made over the last three decades, Gilles Hébert, director of the Mendel Art Gallery, a public museum, has selected 87 pieces for Ms. Mitchell's first retrospective show, called "voices: Joni Mitchell." As recordings of her folk, jazz and rock songs echo gently through the boxy teak galleries here, visitors explore an artistic side to the singer only hinted at in the album covers she has painted over the years. The show includes prairie landscapes, photo montages in which Ms. Mitchell's flaxen hair blends into wheat fields, and cubist oils. There are abstract paintings that at first were hung upside down at the gallery, brightly colored pop portraits in the Peter Max style, a portrait of Georgia O'Keeffe with a Southwestern feel and an erotically charged oil showing a man's hand on a woman's black-stockinged knee. The show opened on June 30, attracting such crowds to the museum, which overlooks the South Sasketchewan River, that streets were blocked to traffic. With some fans making 1,000-mile pilgrimages, the Mendel expects to double its normal attendance during the show, which runs through Sept. 17. "We are averaging one thousand people a day," Mr. Hébert said. "That is amazing to me in a city of 210,000 people."   Related Article • Joni Mitchell Transcends the Musical Packages (May 24, 2000) The show is here because this unpretentious prairie city is home to her parents and to her boyfriend, Donald Freed, also a singer-songwriter. It is rare because Ms. Mitchell, who has plenty of wealth and fame from her music, paints for herself, occasionally giving a work to a friend. "I sing my sorrow," she likes to say, "and I paint my joy." "When you are writing, you need to have a kind of chaotic mind for stimulation," Ms. Mitchell said in a telephone interview after returning to her Bel Air mansion in Los Angeles from the opening here. "Painting is a completely different mental process. It completely clears my mind until I get to the point where I have no thoughts. I get the same charge from juxtaposition of colors as I do from juxtaposition of chords." Mr. Hébert, the show's curator, described long conversations with Ms. Mitchell about art and music. "You never really know which discipline she is talking about," he said. "She slides from one to the other. She will talk about colors chiming or about how tension built up because of discord in her choice of colors. She talks about harmony, she talks about resonance: these are the terms she uses to describe her art." Mendel Gallery "40 Below 0," a painting by Joni Mitchell in her show at the Mendel Gallery in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Ms. Mitchell, now 56, started drawing at age 10 when she was bedridden with polio. She calls her songs audio paintings. In "A Case of You," she wrote and sang, "Oh I am a lonely painter/I live in a box of paints." Generally, Ms. Mitchell's painting style has shifted and evolved in tandem with her music. Referring to late 1960's portraits of Neil Young, a fellow musician and longtime friend from the Canadian prairies, she remarked, "Those line drawings were done at the time when my first records were basically music and guitar. At the time, I started overdubbing my music. I added color to the line drawings, sometimes after the fact. Then as my music got jazzier, I painted abstractly. Now that I am going through a neo-classical style, the painting goes through a neo-classical style." In a review last month in The Globe and Mail, edited in Toronto, Robert Enright, a curator, arts editor and television critic, described Ms. Mitchell as a "worldly version of a naïve artist, indifferent to art trends and the positioning that has so much to do with contemporary art." The prairie, where wind, clouds and snow can be turned into art. While her name will draw people to the museum, he wrote, "her genuine aspiration to be an artist is what will keep them there long after the novelty wears off of a pop icon who paints." In the telephone interview, Ms. Mitchell recalled always having had a love for art. She remembers seeing her first Picassos and Matisses at the house of Frederick S. Mendel, a classmate's grandfather, who in 1964 started the museum where her show is now running. Her formal art training lasted only one year, at an art school in Calgary, Alberta, in the early 1960's. "Turbulent Indigo," one of the 20 album covers she has painted over the last 32 years, graces the exhibition's poster and the cover of its catalog. A self-portrait in blue tones, it shows Ms. Mitchell wearing a bandage over her right ear in a reference to van Gogh's 1889 self-portrait. Ms. Mitchell painted it in 1995, a period when she felt that the music industry was ignoring her. "Of all the painters I felt most kindred to, I felt most touched by van Gogh," she said. "Van Gogh was impulsive. For him, art was like sex on the kitchen table." Ms. Mitchell readily acknowledges that she is vulnerable to charges of dilettantism. After addressing an artists' conference in 1993 on one of her frequent visits home, she read an article in The Star Phoenix, Saskatoon's daily newspaper, in which local painter was quoted as saying that he didn't need a rich rock star telling him that she was a serious artist. In her defense, she said she devoted herself obsessively to her paintings, sometimes neglecting her music to stay up all night to rework a painting in her home studio. Of one oil, she said: "That piece wouldn't let me eat, sleep, go to the bathroom. It was completely compelling." "The art world has a problem with my day job," she continued. "The main trouble with showing my work is that people have a hard time, knowing that I am a musician. They say I am a folkie, a rocker, whatever. This is not a renaissance culture. This is a culture of specialists." The show opens with what she calls her cubist works, montages of brightly colored scenes representing different views of a California beach. Although she has lived in California since 1968, she prefers Canadian scenes, often painted from snapshots taken during visits here. "I go home for renewal," she said. She has drawn particular praise from some critics for "40 Below 0," a 1995 oil depicting an untracked winter road cutting across a snowy landscape while a warm sun sinks over a farm horizon. She described the jeep ride with Mr. Freed that inspired the work. "We were driving on what might be considered the bleakest stretch of road, on the bleakest time of year," Ms. Mitchell said. "When I got out, crystals formed all over the inside of the windshield. "There were the prairies, the stretch of the wind, the movement of the clouds, the skies, all lilac-y and yellow. The windbreak was burgundy, the snow was pink with the sun going down. It was such a rush of color. To be so cold it could kill you in 15 minutes, and yet to look so warm. I felt like a salmon smelling its native stream."   The New York Times on the Web http://www.nytimes.com /-----------------------------------------------------------------\ Visit NYTimes.com for complete access to the most authoritative news coverage on the Web, updated throughout the day. Become a member today! It's free! http://www.nytimes.com?eta \-----------------------------------------------------------------/ HOW TO ADVERTISE - --------------------------------- For information on advertising in e-mail newsletters or other creative advertising opportunities with The New York Times on the Web, please contact Alyson Racer at alyson@nytimes.com or visit our online media kit at http://www.nytimes.com/adinfo For general information about NYTimes.com, write to help@nytimes.com. Copyright 2000 The New York Times Company ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 05:55:13 -0700 (PDT) From: Christopher Otterbeck Subject: Re: Lyrics One of my favotite lines that always makes me smile... "To kiss her, to kiss her, to kiss her, he has to shave" ! <> Chris __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail – Free email you can access from anywhere! http://mail.yahoo.com/ ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 08:57:31 EDT From: Bern44105@aol.com Subject: Re:New York Times covers Mendel Check out this coverage from today's NYTimes: << For Joni Mitchell, Artist, Singing Was Not Enough The singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell's first retrospective art exhibit called "voices: Joni Mitchell" is being shown at a public museum in her hometown of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.>> http://www.nytimes.com/library/arts/082200joni-mitchell-art.html Bern ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 09:10:19 EDT From: CJphoto@aol.com Subject: new york times article... Hello all Joni fans! I posted once on JMDL about a year ago but nothing since then... Thought all should know that the New York times today, Tuesday, August 22nd has a nice article on Joni and her gallery opening up in Canada. All power to the Renascence women! :) ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 09:10:10 -0400 From: "M & C Urbanski" Subject: Re: Lyrics > <> How about: You settle for less than fascination A few drinks later You're not so choosy Marilyn ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 09:26:39 -0400 From: Susan McNamara Subject: quote of the day From today's new york times article: "Of all the painters I felt most kindred to, I felt most touched by van Gogh," she said. "Van Gogh was impulsive. For him, art was like sex on the kitchen table." mommy when I grow up can i be as cool as joni mitchell? :-) ____________________ /____________________\ ||-------------------|| || Sue McNamara || || sem8@cornell.edu || ||___________________|| || O etch-a-sketch O || \___________________/ "It's all a dream she has awake" - Joni Mitchell ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 09:54:49 EDT From: Siresorrow@aol.com Subject: Re: One year ago today in JMDL history (NJC) i remember those 115 posts to the list last year. i kept scrolling through deleting them going...who the f....is this guy posting the same thing over and over again. as it turned out, john's one of the nicest people on the list. ( he's still a grinch virgin, so maybe that's why he's so nice.) pat np. rt. last shift ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 10:10:16 -0400 (EDT) From: Michael Bird Subject: new york times article on joni Finally, the Times takes note of the Mendel exhibit! Today's New York Times ... here's the address: http://www.nytimes.com/library/arts/082200joni-mitchell-art.html ... but first-time visitors may have to log in to the site. Nickel Chief ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 17:09:47 +0200 From: m.harmssen@t-online.de (m.harmssen) Subject: BSN-music questions 2000-08-22 Frankfurt / Germany This was formerly designed as a letter to JONI ( frankly in a way it still is, hopefully she will get to read it in order I get my questions answered. So, anybody who thinks he / she has an answer to one or more of the questions, please feel invited to answer in JONI's place - as will be obvious after reading this, it's quite a bunch of serious stuff............. And not just > oh, what wonderful lyrics in line 28 of court and spark in the 2026 version <, yet to be published -:) Sense of ( slightly damaging ) humour provided.......................... - --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dear Joni - hope you don't mind that I call you like that, interestingly I just can't relate to "Mrs.Mitchell"......... I have been wondering about a few things lately and feel like finding out about them - it all goes around your orchestra production that I purchased about 3 months ago..... Before I start intruding with openminded questions I think I just have to talk a little bit about myself: Age 46, bass player since age 15, composer of larger forms, also orchestra a.s.o. since about age 30, sincere and addicted follower of JACO from 1976 to about 1985 - - I learned my bas(s)ic lessons from him, also as a musician he made me seriously sit down and practice - ending this I'd like to add just a little name dropping, more name dropping would probably be useless because you won't recognize most of them, so the one I mention is BILLY COBHAM whose band I played in for a European tour in 1984.......... I've been thinking about several things concerning the concept of > both sides now <, No. 1 - how was the overall sound of the arrangements achieved - was there any talking about possible basic variation on general terms or was it like ( already ) knowing VINCE MENDOZA and simply handing him the commission to do the work ? No. 2 - did he decide by himself what the sounds were going to be like or did you inform him about overall and special ambiences you were looking for ? No. 3 -who decided to use neither piano nor guitar ( any other possible harmony instrument ) for the rhythm section ? No. 4 - does what your husband writes in the brief note on the music mean that the listener will have to go for a connection between > modern romantic < of the music / song line - up concept and > modern romantic < in the arrangements ? No. 5 - except definitely experienced musicians with an appropriate background who will be able to tell just by neglectable details that it is not, was the basically outdated sound of the music a well- conceived purpose from beginning to end ? No. 6 - are you aware of the fact that, given a different, to make the point in question, a more traditional jazz singer, would turn the whole thing completely upside down in terms of ambience, emotion & direction ? About No. 1, 2 & 3 : just going by intuition I have the basic impression of a "middle-of-the-road" - orchestra treatment, I'm not saying it's bad, why should I, only that it does not really correspond to your highly individual interpretations of the tunes, frankly more of the opposite really ( apart from of course bits and pieces that will tell the trained listener it is not a NELSON RIDDLE or BILLY MAY - arrangement ). Apart from the fact that an attempt is made to render more of a real orchestra sound as opposed to more common use to have a big band - as in the forties - and just add a string section and maybe some french horns, I do have to say that on the whole it really sticks too much to big band practice on one hand and to late romantic orchestra practice on the other - not too late romantic though, more late than earlier STRAUSS of the SALOME- period for instance, let alone MAHLER or even early BERG ( which I think could have been one of possible really innovative points of departure ) - this of course has to do with No. 4. The piano/guitar issue: basically it sounds like a pretty good idea, still for an arranger to leave both of them out means to be very economic about sound treatment, instrumentation - first of all a welcome, quite effective change can always be achieved by very economically handling the remaining rhythm section of bass and drums, which was not done except for cliche - rubato - intros and a few other spots, then next : different woodwind treatment is just as effective though on quite a different level, apart from solo parts of cor anglais, flute and oboe I did not really get to hear nice effects in ambient change, almost all the time woodwinds are being used to simply thicken the string sound, anything else apart from that is not really audible, which is by no means an automatically bad sign - so generally another blank for this one, too. This means, with already two blanks on two major instrumentation issues an eventual wearing - out and actual boredom is being programmed - the listener doesn't get much of a chance to tell one tune from another - and by the way: to omit the whole of the rhythm section does by no means necessarily end in timeless, rhythmically unattractive music, creative sound treatment provided actually the opposite is true - does JAZZ mean "time" always has to be displayed ( with a drum set ) ? - all this is just picking examples, it could well be other examples as well........... Concluding I would like to add a few more general thoughts: I do assume all of the music was done as a serious contribution to the genre - which genre by the way ? - the SINATRA bag ? All this provided I really don't get the point of the modern romantic love cycle, even if at least by the texts - why is the modern romance placed within a sound frame of the Northern American forties, if I may generalize ? Also: is there anything else in a modern romantic love affair than just phenomenons that give themselves exclusively to ballad, slow tempo imagination......? Why does a contribution have to be made that, superficially saying, drowns in nostalgia about a time when music like that was done so much better, even if I do admit that from my point of view it really sounds better only because at the time the SINATRA - stuff happened it really was about zeitgeist, it was zeitgeist turned into sound, which obviously cannot be said about > both sides now < ( back to details: I do agree that locked- hands - sounds always grant a wonderful basic point of an arrangement, I do object though that it always would have to be the same sort of locked - hands, the way O. Peterson plays them is quite different from the way B. Evans plays them, in fact they are identifiers, individually stylish - VINCE MENDOZA picked the middle- of -the - road locked- hands- sound, not including the obvious BRUCE HORNSBY - inflections. An inspirational look at someone like OLIVIER MESSIAEN could have pushed the whole into a sparkling new dimension, instead of employing sounds directly derived from BRUCE HORNSBY it might just as well have been a backleap to his ancestors - STEELY DAN, to come up with still interesting major- seventh- sounds and the like ( I already did that with a little orchestra treatment of an original composition that I recorded with the WARSHAW SYMPHONY - everybody complimented me for the genuine sounds I used for otherwise rather conventional harmonic situations, only that it was so easy to do that, easiest thing in the world - thanx to the BECKER / FAGEN - inspiration about twenty years ago...........) Please do not take all this personally - I do not mean to complain, I'm trying to be frank plus I have questions to be answered - all the best for you and your husband - stay well m. harmssen ( @t-online.de, if you like to get in touch ) - --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- m.harmssen@t-online.de ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 11:24:21 EDT From: SCJoniGuy@aol.com Subject: Re: BSN-music questions m, The only helpful bit I can give you is to let you know that she & Larry Klein are now divorced. I'm sure she would be impressed with your level of inquisition, however! Bob NP: Little Feat, "Rock & Roll Everynight" ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 11:26:14 -0400 From: "Christopher J. Treacy" Subject: Re: BSN-music questions OY VASMIR! Sorry, best I can do... On Tue, 22 Aug 2000 17:09:47 +0200 m.harmssen@t-online.de (m.harmssen) writes: > 2000-08-22 > Frankfurt / Germany > This was formerly designed as a letter to JONI ( frankly in a way it > still is, > hopefully she will get to read it in order I get my questions > answered. > So, anybody who thinks he / she has an answer to one or more of the > questions, > please feel invited to answer in JONI's place - as will be obvious > after reading > this, it's quite a bunch of serious stuff............. > And not just > oh, what wonderful lyrics in line 28 of court and > spark in the > 2026 version <, yet to be published -:) > Sense of ( slightly damaging ) humour > provided.......................... > - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - -------- > > Dear Joni - hope you don't mind that I call you like that, > interestingly I just > can't relate to "Mrs.Mitchell"......... > > I have been wondering about a few things lately and feel like > finding out about > them - it all goes around your orchestra production that I purchased > about 3 > months ago..... > > Before I start intruding with openminded questions I think I just > have to talk a > little bit about myself: > Age 46, bass player since age 15, composer of larger forms, also > orchestra a.s.o. > since about age 30, sincere and addicted follower of JACO from 1976 > to about 1985 > - I learned my bas(s)ic lessons from him, also as a musician he made > me seriously > sit down and practice - ending this I'd like to add just a little > name dropping, > more name dropping would probably be useless because you won't > recognize most of > them, so the one I mention is BILLY COBHAM whose band I played in > for a European > tour in 1984.......... > > I've been thinking about several things concerning the concept of > > both sides > now <, No. 1 - how was the overall sound of the arrangements > achieved - was there > any talking about possible basic variation on general terms or was > it like ( > already ) knowing VINCE MENDOZA and simply handing him the > commission to do the > work ? No. 2 - did he decide by himself what the sounds were going > to be like or > did you inform him about overall and special ambiences you were > looking for ? No. > 3 -who decided to use neither piano nor guitar ( any other possible > harmony > instrument ) for the rhythm section ? No. 4 - does what your husband > writes in > the brief note on the music mean that the listener will have to go > for a > connection between > modern romantic < of the music / song line - up > concept and > > modern romantic < in the arrangements ? > No. 5 - except definitely experienced musicians with an appropriate > background > who will be able to tell just by neglectable details that it is not, > was the > basically outdated sound of the music a well- conceived purpose from > beginning to > end ? > No. 6 - are you aware of the fact that, given a different, to make > the point in > question, a more traditional jazz singer, would turn the whole thing > completely > upside down in terms of ambience, emotion & direction ? > > > About No. 1, 2 & 3 : just going by intuition I have the basic > impression of a > "middle-of-the-road" - orchestra treatment, I'm not saying it's bad, > why should > I, only that it does not really correspond to your highly individual > > interpretations of the tunes, frankly more of the opposite really ( > apart from of > course bits and pieces that will tell the trained listener it is not > a NELSON > RIDDLE or BILLY MAY - arrangement ). Apart from the fact that an > attempt is made > to render more of a real orchestra sound as opposed to more common > use to have a > big band - as in the forties - and just add a string section and > maybe some > french horns, I do have to say that on the whole it really sticks > too much to big > band practice on one hand and to late romantic orchestra practice on > the other - > not too late romantic though, more late than earlier STRAUSS of the > SALOME- > period for instance, let alone MAHLER or even early BERG ( which I > think could > have been one of possible really innovative points of departure ) - > this of > course has to do with No. 4. > The piano/guitar issue: basically it sounds like a pretty good idea, > still for an > arranger to leave both of them out means to be very economic about > sound > treatment, instrumentation - first of all a welcome, quite effective > change can > always be achieved by very economically handling the remaining > rhythm section of > bass and drums, which was not done except for cliche - rubato - > intros and a few > other spots, then next : different woodwind treatment is just as > effective though > on quite a different level, apart from solo parts of cor anglais, > flute and oboe > I did not really get to hear nice effects in ambient change, almost > all the time > woodwinds are being used to simply thicken the string sound, > anything else apart > from that is not really audible, which is by no means an > automatically bad sign - > so generally another blank for this one, too. This means, with > already two blanks > on two major instrumentation issues an eventual wearing - out and > actual boredom > is being programmed - the listener doesn't get much of a chance to > tell one tune > from another - and by the way: to omit the whole of the rhythm > section does by no > means necessarily end in timeless, rhythmically unattractive music, > creative > sound treatment provided actually the opposite is true - does JAZZ > mean "time" > always has to be displayed ( with a drum set ) ? - all this is just > picking > examples, it could well be other examples as well........... > > Concluding I would like to add a few more general thoughts: > I do assume all of the music was done as a serious contribution to > the genre - > which genre by the way ? - the SINATRA bag ? All this provided I > really don't get > the point of the modern romantic love cycle, even if at least by the > texts - why > is the modern romance placed within a sound frame of the Northern > American > forties, if I may generalize ? Also: is there anything else in a > modern romantic > love affair than just phenomenons that give themselves exclusively > to ballad, > slow tempo imagination......? > Why does a contribution have to be made that, superficially saying, > drowns in > nostalgia about a time when music like that was done so much better, > even if I do > admit that from my point of view it really sounds better only > because at the time > the SINATRA - stuff happened it really was about zeitgeist, it was > zeitgeist > turned into sound, which obviously cannot be said about > both sides > now < ( back > to details: I do agree that locked- hands - sounds always grant a > wonderful basic > point of an arrangement, I do object though that it always would > have to be the > same sort of locked - hands, the way O. Peterson plays them is quite > different > from the way B. Evans plays them, in fact they are identifiers, > individually > stylish - VINCE MENDOZA picked the middle- of -the - road locked- > hands- sound, > not including the obvious BRUCE HORNSBY - inflections. An > inspirational look at > someone like OLIVIER MESSIAEN could have pushed the whole into a > sparkling new > dimension, instead of employing sounds directly derived from BRUCE > HORNSBY it > might just as well have been a backleap to his ancestors - STEELY > DAN, to come up > with still interesting major- seventh- sounds and the like ( I > already did that > with a little orchestra treatment of an original composition that I > recorded with > the WARSHAW SYMPHONY - everybody complimented me for the genuine > sounds I used > for otherwise rather conventional harmonic situations, only that it > was so easy > to do that, easiest thing in the world - thanx to the BECKER / FAGEN > - > inspiration about twenty years ago...........) > > > > Please do not take all this personally - I do not mean to complain, > I'm trying to > be frank plus I have questions to be answered - all the best for you > and your > husband - stay well > m. harmssen ( @t-online.de, if you like to get in touch ) > > - ------------------------------------------------------------------------- - -------- > > m.harmssen@t-online.de > ________________________________________________________________ YOU'RE PAYING TOO MUCH FOR THE INTERNET! Juno now offers FREE Internet Access! Try it today - there's no risk! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/tagj. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 11:42:13 -0400 From: "Christopher J. Treacy" Subject: BSN inquiries M, Well maybe I can do a little better than my signature judaic outbust. The concept for 'BSN' came to Joni from a performance she did as a benefit for Don Henley's Walden Woods preservation project. This came in the form of 2 benefit concerts with very high ticket prices, so to make things more interesting for the donors, contemporary pop vocalists were showcased in front of a large orchestra, many of them for the first time. Others on hane included Stevie Nicks, Bjork, Paula Cole, Sahwn Colvin, Sheryl Crow, and Gwen Stefani (from No Doubt). Joni had a blast doing these shows, and though she and Larry are divorced they are obviously still musical partners and friends. Larry coerced Joni into taking the enjoyment she got out of these performances and expanding on them as her own project. Larry Klien is credited with being the 'musical director' for these performances, and Vince Mendoza conducted, so I can only imagine that Joni simply wanted to, being that she was swimming in unknown waters, go with what she felt had already worked once. The concerts I speak of are documented in an AT&T promotional software CD, not made available on the commercial market, called "Stormy Weather", which is the only track Joni performs on it. Interestingly enough, several of the other choices that are highlighted on the CD are ones that Joni decided to do herself on 'BSN' (At Last, You've Changed...). The 'BSN' concept has now florished into a trilogy (we'll see what happens), the secong portion of which will be a disc of orchestral re-workings of all JM material, which she chose to highlight somewhat as encores at the 'BSN' shows. Finally, I don't think she was looking to break any new ground with this project, nor was she looking to create anything deserving of a compare and contrast study against the work of other composers, arrangers, a/o vocalists. She did this because she enjoyed the feel of the 'big band', as she calls it, behind her...a chance to put down her guitar and pen, which takes a lot of pressure off of someone like Joni mItchell. Does that help at all? -Chris. NP: "Rockin' Chair" - Gwen McCrae. ________________________________________________________________ YOU'RE PAYING TOO MUCH FOR THE INTERNET! Juno now offers FREE Internet Access! Try it today - there's no risk! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/tagj. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 12:13:03 EDT From: Murphycopy@aol.com Subject: Ray Davies featured in Salon.com's Brilliant Careers (NJC) Salon.com has an article about Ray Davies today: http://www.salon.com/people/bc/2000/08/22/davies/index.html --Bob Murphy ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 10:07:56 -0700 From: RandyRemote Subject: Re: NYTimes.com Article: For Joni Mitchell, Artist, Singing Was Not Enough Joni has been called alot of things, but this must be a first: > In a review last month in The Globe and Mail, > Robert Enright, > described Ms. Mitchell as a "worldly version of a naïve ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 10:07:39 -0700 From: RandyRemote Subject: Re: Sweet Sucker Dance JRMCo1@aol.com wrote: Anyway, the Bread and Roses organization's headquarters is just a couple of blocks from where I live in Marin County, California. > So, figuring I had nothing to lose, I called and requested a copy of the sound board recording of this concert. Would be incredible if you could get your hands on it...it was a two day affair, at least 10 hours long....maybe longer...so many great performers. Mark wrote: Count me in as a branch for this one... any idea if it includes Joni's songs with BB King? Hopefully this part was lost! It was terrible! She did Coyote, and it was clear BB's band had never heard it, and if they ran through it backstage, it didn't show, they blew every last chord change, with Joni plugging away on acoustic. Then, sans guitar, Joni traded lines with King on his signature tune "The Thrill is Gone". The trouble with this was that every time she opened her mouth to sing he either sang over her or played a lick on Lucille...it was painful...like watching a gizelle dance with an elephant... The visual was great though, and lest you think me a BB King basher, the rest of his set was great. RR ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 10:08:33 -0700 From: RandyRemote Subject: Re: BSN-music questions So, in essence, you are saying the arrangements are outdated, boring, and unimaginative, but that's not neccesarily a bad thing? For the most part, I would have to agree. RR (Joni says she does not have a computer. ) ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 10:31:47 -0700 From: Steve Dulson Subject: Wayne Shorter Matt Snyder wrote (several days ago - a digest just showed up late): >Wayne has never appeared with Joni live, either on tour or even >for one night. I really wanted him on the BSN tour. Pacific Amphitheatre, Costa Mesa, CA 10/27/87. That was the benefit emceed by Peter Coyote. - -- ######################################################### Steve Dulson Costa Mesa CA steve@psitech.com "The Tinker's Own" http://www.tinkersown.com "Southern California Dulcimer Heritage" http://members.aol.com/scdulcimer/ "The Living Tradition Concert Series" http://www.thelivingtradition.org/ ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 13:43:04 -0400 From: Susan McNamara Subject: Fwd: Re: NYTimes.com Article: For Joni Mitchell, Artist, Singing Was Not Enough Randy said: >Joni has been called alot of things, but this must be a first: > > > In a review last month in The Globe and Mail, > > Robert Enright, > > described Ms. Mitchell as a "worldly version of a naïve HA HA! I think they were trying to say naive artist with an accent over the i and personally I think this is a very condescending way to describe Joni's art or am I too touchy? It's like she's some kind of idiot savant or something. or am I wrong on this definition of naive? i see it as some hoity toity art critic patting her on the head saying, "oh isn't that nice the pop star wants to be an artist." That was the only thing in the article that bugged me though. Otherwise I thought it was great. ____________________ /____________________\ ||-------------------|| || Sue McNamara || || sem8@cornell.edu || ||___________________|| || O etch-a-sketch O || \___________________/ "It's all a dream she has awake" - Joni Mitchell ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 15:08:38 -0400 From: "Christopher J. Treacy" Subject: "Please - Just Don't"???? M. Harmssen wrote :please - just don't and otherwise : contribute m.harmssen@t-online.de. WOW! Is all I can say to that. NP:"Tall In The Saddle"-Joan Armatrading "...One of these days, you're gonna have to dismount..." ________________________________________________________________ YOU'RE PAYING TOO MUCH FOR THE INTERNET! Juno now offers FREE Internet Access! Try it today - there's no risk! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/tagj. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 15:18:08 EDT From: IVPAUL42@aol.com Subject: Re: BSN-music questions In a message dated 8/22/00 11:31:13 AM Eastern Daylight Time, SCJoniGuy@aol.com writes: << I'm sure she would be impressed with your level of inquisition, however! >> No one expects the German Inquisition! Their most terrying tactic is fear and surpris... wait, no... their TWO most terrifying tactics are fear, surprise and heavy bass overdubbing... uh, wait, no.... try again... Their THREE most terrifying tactics are fear, surprise, heavy bass overdubbing and ... On, never mind. Stick to the Spanish Inquisition, you're much more likely to get an answer from Joni about it. Paul I ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 13:19:19 -0700 From: "Kakki" Subject: Re: Re: NYTimes.com Article: For Joni Mitchell, Artist, SingingWas Not Enough Sue wrote: > HA HA! I think they were trying to say naive artist with an >accent over the i and personally I think this is a very >condescending way to describe Joni's art or am I too >touchy? It's like she's some kind of idiot savant or >something. or am I wrong on this definition of naive? i see >it as some hoity toity art critic patting her on the head >saying, "oh isn't that nice the pop star wants to be an artist." >That was the only thing in the article that bugged me >though. Otherwise I thought it was great. Thanks for sending the article. There was a lot of new content in it. I would also bristle as Joni being classifed as a "naive" artist because it is not only condescending but also an incorrect "classification." The quote about her being a "worldly version of a naive artist, indifferent to art trends and the positioning that has so much to do with contemporary art" was taken from an earlier article by Robert Enright which appeared in the Toronto Globe and Mail. In that case, I interpreted Enright's context as actually complimenting her. But then again it just may be a left-handed compliment! I feel that it may be many years into the future before Joni's art is given a truly insightful appraisal. Kakki NP: Cry, Cry, Cry - I Know What Kind of Love This Is ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 18:18:49 -0300 From: "Wally Kairuz" Subject: NJC not just any.... ...other birthday!!!!! but MADAME SORCERESS HERSELF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ASHARA, eternally playful dolphin and lion!!! blessings, wallyk ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 23 Aug 2000 00:06:32 +0200 From: m.harmssen@t-online.de (m.harmssen) Subject: Re: BSN-music questions IVPAUL42@aol.com schrieb: > In a message dated 8/22/00 11:31:13 AM Eastern Daylight Time, > SCJoniGuy@aol.com writes: > > << I'm sure she would be impressed with your level of inquisition, however! >> > > No one expects the German Inquisition! > > Their most terrying tactic is fear and surpris... wait, no... > their TWO most terrifying tactics are fear, surprise and heavy bass > overdubbing... uh, wait, no.... try again... > Their THREE most terrifying tactics are fear, surprise, heavy bass > overdubbing and ... > On, never mind. Stick to the Spanish Inquisition, you're much more likely to > get an answer from Joni about it. > > Paul I yes, torture him with ice-cold Northern Canadian JM cushions, or no, better, torture him with BSN twenty times in a row, headphones of course, or even better, torture the German inquisitor with arranging all of Joni's songs for 120-piece orchestra, all Richard - Wagner -style certainly.........-:) m.harmssen@t-online.de ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 23 Aug 2000 00:06:32 +0200 From: m.harmssen@t-online.de (m.harmssen) Subject: Re: Wayne Shorter Steve Dulson schrieb: > Matt Snyder wrote (several days ago - a digest just showed up late): > > >Wayne has never appeared with Joni live, either on tour or even > >for one night. I really wanted him on the BSN tour. > > Pacific Amphitheatre, Costa Mesa, CA 10/27/87. That was the benefit > emceed by Peter Coyote. > > -- > > ######################################################### > Steve Dulson Costa Mesa CA steve@psitech.com > "The Tinker's Own" http://www.tinkersown.com > "Southern California Dulcimer Heritage" http://members.aol.com/scdulcimer/ > "The Living Tradition Concert Series" http://www.thelivingtradition.org/ > that Wayne Shorter is said to have never played with Joni live is just a rumour. He actually did - I remember something on German television years ago, a huge festival I think in Japan, where Wayne could be seen sitting just next to Joni, I think it was even a duo they were doing, but it didn't sound very nice. m.harmssen@t-online.de ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 23 Aug 2000 00:06:41 +0200 From: m.harmssen@t-online.de (m.harmssen) Subject: BSN well, first of all to Chris Treacy :thanx for some apparently valid information. I do love SINATRA - stuff, opposed to what maybe a lot of people on your continent might think about Germans in general, I was raised with SINATRA, that sound is just part of my life, so basically I wouldn't really find any proper way to put JONI's endeavour down without tearing down to some degree what I love .... In the > inquiries < I was trying to come to the point, quite dramatically at times I admit, but that's how I do it for clearing reasons. There's noone telling JONI to be inventive, break new grounds a.s.o., still with a production that was released around 2000 without referring clearly or openly to > the good old days of radio jazz < plus the fact it's a JM production I was inclined to expect something...... Also if you really take a closer look at the arrangements on BSN, the funny thing will be it's not really the old sounds all over, there are spots here and there that bespeak a certain difference in harmonic approach, taste or zeitgeist that is - this finally is what bugs me, an attempt here and there, tread some water to create the illusion of maybe arriving on new coasts, but then again...... however, there are spots that show a tendency for let's say refreshing the format m.harmssen@t-online.de ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 17:14:00 -0500 From: "Susan" Subject: Amelia & More > Jim Leahy wrote: Whenever Amelia came on, I would break down in tears over the lines "A > ghost of aviation, she was swallowed by the sky, or by the sea; like me, > she had a dream to fly." Being an analytical kind of guy, I wanted to > know why it affected me so much. > I have been down so many roads with Joni and engaged by so many lyrics at different points in my life, that it would be difficult to choose one favorite. So since I have been known to pontificate, I will choose a few and try to keep it as short as possible. And Jim thanks for sharing this, I was touched in many ways. So her goes I am going to try to keep it to 5. 1. Out on some borderline some mark of in-between, I lay down golden in time and woke up vanishing. Sweetbird you are briefer than a falling star, all these vain promises on beauty jars, somewhere with your wings on time you must be laughing. (Just a very clear picture of your own aging & mortality. Words that I was also warned about, I never argued with an elder when they told me I would be younger a lot shorter than I'd be old. I expected it and pretty much welcomed it.) 2. And the sun poured in like butterscotch and stuck to all my senses. (Enough said, total visual) 3. You've got to shake your fists at lightning now You've got to roar like forest fire You've got to spread your light like blazes All across the sky They're going to aim the hoses on you Show 'em you won't expire Not till you burn up every passion Not even when you die Come on now You've got to try If you're feeling contempt Well then you tell it If you're tired of the silent night Jesus, well then you yell it Condemned to wires and hammers Strike every chord that you feel (Well for me this is all about getting on with living versus fading away, a position I and many others may have been in, at some low point in our lives. But I do often hear these words ringing in my head now when I feel empowered) 4. I'm porous with travel fever But you know I'm so glad to be on my own Still somehow the slightest touch of a stranger Can set up trembling in my bones I know - no one's going to show me everything We all come and go unknown Each so deep and superficial Between the forceps and the stone (I have seen this verse mention by several of you, no need for me to expound) 5. So what are you going to do about it You can't live life and you can't leave it Advice and religion-you can't take it You can't seem to believe it The peacock is afraid to parade You're under the thumb of the maid You really can't give love in this condition Still you know how you need it (This verse speaks to me concerning my beliefs and lack there of, or my vacillating somewhere in-between. This verse also seems very succinct in its poetic meter, as it relates to the music end of the piece. Not sure I used the correct term, it sounds right, hope you know what I mean.) These are the ones that stand out for me today and have for years, but I am sure as I scan the lyrics closer than ever now, I will find more. But there are my top five verses - lines whatever. I love this thread! Peace Susan ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 23:25:43 +0100 From: catman Subject: Re: BSN-music questions > or no, better, > torture him with BSN twenty times in a row, headphones of course, or even better, make them listen just once to Mingus! ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 18:45:38 EDT From: FMYFL@aol.com Subject: Re: NJC not just any.... In a message dated 8/22/00 5:38:07 PM Eastern Daylight Time, wallykai@interserver.com.ar writes: << HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ASHARA, eternally playful dolphin and lion!!! blessings, wallyk >> My little Walter couldn't have said it better! Ashara, you have given so much of yourself to the JMDL. I thank you for everything you've done for all of us. You are truly a wonder woman and someone I'm proud to have as a friend. Wally Breese is up there smiling and thanking you too! Have the best birthday ever! Love and Hugs to you, Jimmy ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2000 20:45:11 -0300 From: "Wally Kairuz" Subject: RE: BSN-music questions harmssen, i found your questionnaire very interesting. a few points: 1- i think that the use of the word ''romantic'' in the liner notes does not refer to the romantic school but simply to emotional attachments. thus, i don't find an intended co-relation between the orchestration style and the german romantics. 2- much though i'd LOVE [and i can't emphasize this statement enough!!!!!!!] a rendition a la final scene of salome of ANYTHING at all, i believe that the general tenor of BSN is popular and, yes, FORTIES. i think that many of the arrangement choices were made with that concept in mind, precluding any touches of elektra here and there. 3- all this said, i have to confess [and i won't run for cover] that i find BSN derivative and boring. joni's part is fine, i guess, but the orchestra and the arrangements are SO unimaginative. they stick to the prevailing styles of the era but in a formulaic way that doesn't add any value to the realm of cover art. whenever artists decide to do a new cover they should ask themselves: ''does the world need this or do we have enough already?'' i can't help but consider BSN a poor man's ''what's new'' [ronstadt/riddle's album]. this is strictly subjective, and i don't base my opinion on the formal study of the orchestral structure or the lack of piano and guitar. it's just a feeling. if you are going to record the 100,000th version of ''stormy weather'', you should have something new to say. in a way, BSN has placed joni in yet another awkward category: that of crossover artist!!!! for all her pioneering work as a jazz composer, she is so much of a stranger in the realm of cover art as, say, jessye norman or dawn upshaw. she has crossed the genre boundary. fortunately, compared with norman or upshaw, joni comes out smelling like a rose, but she is still at the mercy of the arranger. there's no way she can handle an orchestra that size without formal training. she can make suggestions, she can inspire the musicians with metaphors and color associations, etc., but it is ultimately the arranger that puts concepts in black and white [alas, in this case literally!] and unless they are conducting, no amount of will power on the part of singers can change the course of the orchestral flow. how many times your favorite opera singers have to subject themselves to the whims and/or the mediocrity of the regisseur and/or the conductor!!! maybe for her next cover project, joni will find an arranger/conductor that can be faithful to the genre and still add the thrill of a new reading to what otherwise could be a dull mass of strings and winds. in other words, an album that i can put on the same shelf with my ellas and my blossoms, where it was to all appearances supposed to be. wallyK, argentine branch of the global inquisition [meaning i'm a teacher...] ------------------------------ End of JMDL Digest V2000 #462 ***************************** ------- Post messages to the list at Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe joni-digest" to ------- Siquomb, isn't she?